closed Brandable? UBGM.COM - You be General Manager (Hotel Career Site)

[typist]

UBGM.COM

You Be General Manager?

It never occured to me that this domain might be brandable - until I thought about UB40 today.

UBGM.COM - a Career Website for the hotel industry. The term "GM" is widely used in the industry, and it's virtually every hotel school graduates' dream to eventually become GM.

I picked up this domain in 2004, simply because it was available and I needed a short domain for email use for a (rather anonymous) holding company, which was named accordingly (the acronym does seem to be used by very few others, as far as I can see only obscure organizations like the "belgian mini-golf union" etc). I never set up any content except a test page and redirects to parking pages.

This may be a long shot, but I think I've seen far some more creative constructions...

Any input is appreciated!

 

[typist]

regfee...?

 

[globetrotter]

Nice idea but it wouldnt work for the hotel business. Hoteliers are kind of old fashioned and like things done properly which includes domains. If you look at the main sites for hoteliers (ehotelier.com, caterer.com ..) you will see that nearly all domains are fully spelled out. I dont think GM's would visit this domain name

J

 

[typist]

Nice idea but it wouldnt work for the hotel business. Hoteliers are kind of old fashioned and like things done properly which includes domains. If you look at the main sites for hoteliers (ehotelier.com, caterer.com ..) you will see that nearly all domains are fully spelled out. I dont think GM's would visit this domain name

J

I appreciate your input, and I think I get your point - too informal?

Nevertheless, I wasn't thinking about a site for GM's: there simply aren't too many of them and many of them have reached the top of their career, for obvious reasons. A career site would rather target prospective GMs, ie hotel school students, recent graduates and young employees - and the text message generation does seem to love this kind of language. Just a thought.

cheers,
mathias


PS eHotelier.com may not be the best example for a fully spelled out domain? I just stumbled across hcareers.com; now think about slh.com or lhw.com - not really spelled out. I'd even say they demonstrate that brevity may be useful per se - just as in the acronym GM itself.

 

[globetrotter]

Anything is possible especially with domains.

The idea with what you want to do with the site is great but is in many ways exactly what Ehotelier is. Its by far the most popular website for hoteliers and there is a good mix of graduates, chefs, GM's etc on the forum. I have been using the site since graduation and most of my friends and I have become GM since and still use it. There is just a great mix of nationalities and experience. I think the domain is pretty solid. The only thing i dislike about ehotelier is the design and layout. So there is room for competition.

I agree with the GM part of yout domain but I cant help but completely miss the GM idea behind the domain when i look at it. It just has no real effect on me. But like i said, maybe it works for others. What would the UB stand for in the domain? I do wish you all the best!!

In regards to hcareers.com. For me that is a good site as it has a keyword in it and the H standing for hotels. Thats different then having no real word inside a domain. The other 2 urls do work and its good you pointed it out. However those domains are consumer oriented and the LHW for example is more of a sales and marketing group for the hotels and the real hoteliers have little to do with the actual marketing and sales side at LHW. If they would have been i would date to bet that they would have ended up with longer and more complete domain.

I was checking for some domains the other day and there are some really good available domains which could be used for a site like you envision. So if you would start a site like that then I would recommend to use a somewhat more traditional domain for that. Thats just my thought on it, hope it helps.

See you later!

JB